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India’s External Relations
(a) India’s Nuclear policy
(b) Consensus in foreign policy matters.
(a)The main components of India’s Nuclear Policy are as given below :
(i) India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru had faith in science and technology for rapidly building a modern India. An important component of his industrialisation plans was the nuclear programme initiated under the guidance of Homi J. Bhabha.
(ii) India is in favour of use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes.
(iii) Nehru was against nuclear weapons.
(iv) India did not sign the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) of 1968 because it considered it as discriminatory.
(v) After conducting its first nuclear test, India termed it as peaceful explosion.
(b) In recent years there has been consensus in foreign policy matters. Since 1977 when the Janata Party came to power, all governments. Congress or non-Congress have taken initiatives for restoring better relations with China and entering into close ties with the US. Similarly efforts are being made to have good relations with Pakistan.
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“Broadly, non-alignment means not tying yourself off with military blocs... It means trying to view things, as far as possible, not from the military point of view, though that has to come in sometimes, but independently, and trying to maintain friendly relations with all countries. ” —Jawaharlal Nehru
(a) Why does Nehru want to keep off military blocs ?
(b) Do you think that the Indo-Soviet friendship treaty violated the principle of non-alignment ? Give reasons for your answer.
(c) If there were no military blocs, do you think non-alignment would have been unnecessary ?
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